Thursday, 30 June 2011

Went for my annual diabetic review today and everything looks OK . I'm still doing so many drugs that certain South Americans would love to make my acquaintance , but I ain'yt to enamoured with the alternative.

Is used to be if you were iverwight and over 40 then you might end up with Diabetes, and the treatment of it includes keeping fit , losing weight , eating and drinking the right stuff (no cake , chocolate or alcohol) . What surprised me today is that most of the people at the clinic were young and anything but overweight. So what the hell is happening . Obviously modern living is screwing up people big style.

There are a lot of diabetic sites out there which may help answer the question . You can start here!.

Sunday, 26 June 2011

I see a lot of folk rightly complaining about the latest price rise on fuel , but I'm lucky , mostly I'm indirectly affected. However I filled up my car at the weekend and immedietly doubled its value (the write off value is £50 , which is what it now costs to fill up).

unusually the villains of the piece are the oil companies , who let's face it DO deserve most of the flack they get but think on this. David Cameron , that brilliant responsibilty dodger (Nick Clegg knows) is the latest in a long line of politicians not really taking responsibility just the financial fruits of a captive market. . After the petrol company and garage set their price of about 54p the government adds on fuel duty and VAT which result in another 170% being added on to the price you pay (around £1.40).

So when the goverment say they cant't do anything about the price of fuel , you what they are talking . It's an easy win for them , and will do until they can find a way of taxing the air that we breathe!!

I am sold on E-Books , and I love paper , but was decided that I would buy myself a Kindle eventually. However that idea has just been blown out of the water. Why? You may ask.

Earlier this year after being tempted by the concept of Apple's iPad but well aware of the amount of Apple related garbage and baggage that would come with it , I purchsed an Advent Vega tablet which is Android based , and is an excellent piece of kit , but you cant actually add applications to it via the Android Marketplace as its a 10" tablet (too big) and doesnt have 3G connectivity built in . Marketplace has been implicitly promised and it does havethe WH Smiths e-Reader which will allow you to only read books purchased from WH Smiths.

This morning I visited Android Pit , which allowed install of their Marketplace App on my Vega and allowed me to install the excellent Aldiko e-Reader.

So no I have my e-reader , yes it's a 10 incher , but does the job excellently ,so I now don't need to purchase a Kindle because I have something else that will do the job. Yes the vega only has a 10 hour battery life and its backlit , but it does it for. It ends here , I can read e-books wherever and whener I want!!

Saturday, 18 June 2011

Just been for dinner and had a very nice meal at the Harviestoun Country Hotel and Restaurant. At reception I noticed a pile of CDs and a plaque on the wall. i was then asked if I knew of the Mull Historical Society.

It turns out the restaurant is run by Colin McIntyre's mum. Colin was the driving force behind the superb Mull Historical Society active between 2001 and 2005 , and Colin is now solo . I immediately snaffled a copy of his "Islands" CD along with complimentary signed copy of "Be My Saviour" so result all round. Enjoy The Final Arrears , superb record.

Tuesday, 14 June 2011

Amazon.co.uk Widgets
Sometime in the pastI wrote an article on the fact that CDs were the MacDonaldisation of music , a situation amplified by the rise of digital music and sampled ringtones . A lot of the initial arguments for CD was that they were robust and offered far higher quality that old scratchy vinyl. This paved the way for downloaded music , and one of the huge benefits has been that long deleted music could be made available as it did not need to pressed on a run of CDs that may never sell.

Project Gutenberg is a labour of love that has seen a lot of out of copyeight books stored in digital format , which anyone can download for free.

I actually see that paper and ebook readers will co exist. The Ape of Wrath states that "The push to digital is inevitable." , which is true because we want what we want , now and in a convenient format. Paul Campbell the scriptwriter has been encouraging me to get a Kindle, lauding the device and extolling it's benefits. They certainly save space!! And they remember where you were in your book , and you can have it now!!!

To Be Read.....

Paper is convenient , cheap , robust , doesnt need power but does need light!! . Just wondering how much "gentlemen's relish" is available on the Kindle for "under the sheets" perusal.

I will buy a Kindle before Christmas , but I have a few books to read before then , things to do , and by the time I get one there will be a Super Kindle. But I am sold on the idea , but I still like paper very much.

Sunday, 12 June 2011

Tomorrow Take That release Progressed , a double CD of eight new songs from the Progress sessions plus the Progress album , which every Take That fan will already have. So you're paying for an album you already have , in order to get the "new" songs.

But take a step back . The album is available for less than ten quid , so eight tracks for ten quid is actually decent value for money , and you can give your copy of Progress away to a friend or whatever or drop it in to Music Magpie and get a quid or so back. You also have the option of downloading the tracks individually , though that will probably cost you around £8!!

Tickets for the gigs are around £50 so really the cost of Progressed is fine, in fact I reckon that fans have been treated more than fairly with Progressed!!

While I can see the benefits of the Kindle , I stll think that books will be around for a long, long time. I just picked up a couple of beautifully produced editins of "Lyra's Oxford" and "Once Upon a Time in the North" by Philip Pullman. All the text and pictures could easily be incorporated in a Kindle edition, but there is no substitute for the gorgeous books.

Yes I think the Kindle will get stronger and stronger , but still feel it will complement the current book market , not take it over. I will probably get one eventually, but still wouldnt be happy thinking I could lose my book collection if I lost my piece of hardware.

Saturday, 11 June 2011

Amazon.co.uk Widgets
A good friend of mine made a comment using what seemed to be a made up word and got thinking of famous people who often display their idiocy by doing this in the full glare of the public. When you're at school you will often make up words in this way and think you are the first person to think of this . Pter Andre decided he was a genius when he came up with "Insaniac" on reality TV. He made a single , sold lots of records , so maybe he was. Sarah Palin came up with "refudiate" and compared herself with Shakespeare because of it . Well the bard is four hundred years in the ground , and most people would like Sarah Palin to be in the same situation , so again I suppose she is right in a way. See the article here.

Anyway I combined therir names and came up with Palinandrism (noun: Masking your shortcomings in vocabulary by making up words) , putting myself in that group. I'm just wonder if anyone else will start using it. How do words come into being . I know the compilers of the Oxford English Dictionary have something to do with it.

Also my vague IT background exposes me to lots of meaning less names and phrases which generally want you to punch the perpetrator's lights out. "Thinking Outside The Box" , "Obfuscation", "Object Orientation" and "Blue Sky Thinking" are several that just annoy me , and they are the tip of a large ever growing iceberg (though not sure whether that is the correct metaphor to use. Anyway that's my rant so far....